Naruto Drabbles
by Chibi Zia
Summary: A collection of Team Seven drabbles, in which I abuse fonts, trauma buttons, you are half inside incoherent thoughts and it's all very dramatic post timeskip spoilers. Mostly dark with a side dish of hope.
1. Naruto: Wake up

This was inspired by the song "Wake Up" by Three Days Grace. Because Naruto isn't _sane_ all that much anymore.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Naruto wakes up in the dead of the night and he runs to Sasuke's apartment.

He pounds on the door -- _why aren't you waking up, jerk! _-- screaming his lungs out. He's pounding with both hands now, demanding an answer -- _get out here, I know you're here where the hell are you! _-- and he can hear somebody shouting at him to just **shut up**, already, and he opens his eyes -- _when did they close? _-- hopeful, he's made such a racket Sasuke woke up and he's got his shit-eating grin so wide on his face and --_ it's okay, he's here, Sasuke's here_ -- the voice continues, saying that the kid leaving there left two years ago.

His hands drop back to his side and his smile fades.

He returns back to the training grounds like a ghost, like a man who just learned that his worse nightmare came true and it's only after he's lying down and watching the stars that he swears -- _it's a promise of a lifetime again, see _-- that if -- _not if, not if, **when**, can't doubt, not now not here never _ -- Sasuke comes back, he'll make him pay for not being there tonight. Yesterday and all the days before that, too.

Make him pay for not being there when he needed him. Not being there when Sakura needed him. Not being there when they **needed** him.

For simply not being there.


	2. Sasuke: Of wishes and reality

Because post timeskip, Sasuke is ready to give up his body on the excuse of not being "strong enough on his own", and I realised just how much more broken the kid got after two and a half years. Also, the drug thing is only half-canon, it could have been that or a forbidden jutsu. I like the drugs better.

---------------------------------------------------------------

Sasuke wishes he could cry, laugh, scream, _bleed_ as he looks into the mirror, perfect reflection, perfect looks, perfect perfect perfect _wish I was_.

The drugs keep his reactions carefully controlled and it seems odd -- _maybe it's me that grew? _-- because he's never been this perfectly calm in his life, yet he knows the look on his face like he's seen it countless times, forever and ever etched into his memories. It's not his own -- _not calm not perfect not controlled not enough hatred weak weak weak weak_ -- this face is the one he thinks about all day, dreams of all night, the only one he **has** to remember, because otherwise ... otherwise... otherwise this has been all for naught. All of it -- _pain tears blood regret nightmares screams_ -- he has done for that one face. And it seems he is looking at it each time he passes a mirror, each time he sees somebody else and this is good because -- _he is everything_ -- he has not forgotten the hate and the **hurt**, or his purpose. He is here to attain that and he has learned, with time, what he needs to come to that point -- _his power, not mine, not enough, not enough hatred not enough everything too weak _-- and he's almost there.

Sasuke looks at the remnaints of his reflection and sees a twelve year old boy and his team somewhere in the pieces and really, truly wishes he could scream.

_I wish I was strong enough on my own_


	3. Sasuke: Seeing you again

Written for the prompt "Sasuke on Post Timeskip!Naruto, the first time he sees him". Said something about Sasuke being hard to catch for me during that battle, because of the whole drug/seemingly dead thing. Tried anyway. Coherency lost the battle in Sasuke's brain, though.

------------------------------------------------------

After two and a half years, Sasuke sees Naruto again.

At first there is that boy, Sai -- _replacement, weak, "bonds"? _-- then he sees Sakura -- _"I love you"s and tears and protect only not anymore_ -- and that man, he's not quite sure of his name -- _Not Kakashi, don't care, kill you_ -- and the last to come is Naruto. Naruto looks different from last time, more alive -- _not wet not dead, rain of tears and chidori and should be dead but not, choose not to kill, right? Yes, chose, not like him_ -- less angry. He looks shocked but will probably change that to angry, to determined in a second, after he caught on -- _dead last, not quite sharp, predictable but not, rival no not anymore, no more bonds _-- and after the initial prowesses, the speech he says forms itself and he doesn't need to think, he's practiced it for the next time all this time. He attacks them and he's not quite sure who he's fighting, but he doesn't care. He has kusanagi out, ready -- _chose not to on a whim, not like him, but if I wanted, could kill you on another whim_ -- and he watches the Kyuubi and everything feels mecanic, fake. Of course maybe it's the drugs, -- _stronger, faster, better, still not enough but works, yet can't feel can't act, blocked sensations, blocked feelings, but it's good 'cause those are useless, useless like... like...? _-- they always make him feel weird, it can't be for any other reasons. He speaks with the fox, speaks with Naruto and Sakura and -- _replacements, useless replacements of useless bonds, cut those, don't care, don't care_ -- is only stopped from getting rid of them by someone -- _snake poison touch scream pain power_ -- by Orochimaru. He doesn't care, they speak some more, he knows some part of him is listening but he's not and they leave -- _"might be useful"? Can't be useful, but would be useless to kill them too, wouldn't bring me anything, wouldn't bring me anything I want anymore_ -- going to some other refuge. The Sound village is always moving so it doesn't matter where they are.

Sasuke's left alone after that, to do what he wishes. He goes to his room, he has one in every "hide-out", intending to go back to sleep.

Sasuke closes his eyes and for the first time in so long what he sees isn't red eyes but blue and green ones.

He's stopped screaming or crying when he dreams of Itachi -- _drugs or used to it, which is worst? _-- yet he can't stop himself for waking up in fear from this one.

_I keep cutting the bonds but they never do._


	4. Naruto: Dreams of Another Summer

This was written for the prompt "Naruto and Sasuke's headband". My inner Naruto failed to understand the concepts of "headband" and thought it meant "Naruto on Sasuke and Happy Endings". My inner Naruto, like the real one, is either selectively deaf or stupid. More sweet than sad.

----------------------------------------------------------

Naruto sleeps with Sasuke's headband under his pillow.

For as long as he had that headband -- _long, too long, far too long _-- he's been keeping it with him, in his bag when he's traveling with _ero-sennin_ or in his dresser when he's at his apartment or simply in his pocket. So when Sasuke comes back -- _soon, can't wait any longer, soon soon **soon**_ -- he can give him back to him with a grin and a 'see, good as new'. Then Sakura-chan will cry -- _of joy, joy this time only joy_ -- and the bastard will point out the scratch he never refilled and he'll say, he'll say 'Proof that I could hit your damn forehead, jerk!' and Sasuke will scoff. Because that's how they are, and Sakura will say 'stop antagonizing Sasuke-kun, Naruto' and everything will be just like before. Except things will be even better, because it can't go any worse and they've grown up, matured, but they'll stil answer like their old selves. It can't be any other way.

Because it's the way the story works -- _right? _-- and it's not only a melody of a summer well passed. It's their story, with a boy and a girl and a rival. It's the way things work and they won't have it any other way. It's impossible.

Naruto sleeps with Sasuke's headband clutched in his hand and dreams of their story's happy ending, but sometimes he wakes and the metal has dug into his skin -- _or maybe it's his claws_ -- because the ending isn't always happy.

But he ignores those moments of doubts, because unhappy endings only exist if you believe in them, and it's the same way the other way around. So he believes in his happy ending...

_Right until I can't believe in it anymore. _


	5. AU Future: Revenge doesn't make it right

Because Itachi played a too big part on Sasuke to let me think when he's dead, everything will be alright. To note, Sasuke is exaggerating the time; it has probably been one or two days, max. Like Naruto has that much patience. Written before any of the other pieces, has can be seen by the lack of italics in between the hyphens. Style changes and all.

--------------------------------------------------

It seems like it's been months, now. Going on and off in his own mind, waking up and doing the same routine day after day and then dreaming over and over again, of Orochimaru, of team seven, of Itachi, of the clan, of ...

He had obtained it. His revenge. He hadn't known -- hadn't thought, hadn't wanted, hadn't possibly _known_ -- it would have left him this way. On and off, like a switch. He hadn't spoken to either Naruto, Sakura or Kakashi since then. He was forced out of bed, forced out of his appartment and dragged and then acted like they wanted him to.

Minus the talking. He couldn't bring himself to speak, because he didn't know what to _say_ anymore. He hadn't known what to say since his sword at pierced his brother's heart, since he felt the blood of Itachi -- of his brother, of his own kin, of his _clan_ -- on his hands, splattered on his face. Since he had burned the body without leaving a trace, since he had become, truely this time, the last Uchiha. How long had it been? Days? Weeks, months, _years_? He couldn't bring himself to care.

Of course he had known it wouldn't bring him happiness. He hadn't been looking for happiness, so that was fine. It was simply supposed to bring him peace -- to bring _them_ peace, ghosts and spirits around the compound, screaming in betrayal and _pay back the blood lost_ and _it's your fault_ -- yet it hadn't. His heart wasn't at peace, neither were the ghosts. Why couldn't they let it go? Why couldn't _he_ let it go?

"Oi, bastard."

And the voice breaks his thoughts and he can't bring himself to quite care. A hand pulls him by his shirt and he lifts his eyes, focusing on Naruto's mouth, trying to make out the words flowing out of his lips. It seems like nonsense still.

"Look at me."

The few words he can make out are even nonsense -- he's looking at him, see, his mouth and even trying to listen, so just leave him alone for once. Just this once, and maybe he'll even tell him what an idiot he is. Like old times. So just let go already.

"I want you to look in my fucking eyes, you jerk!"

Eyes. People have those? Oh, right. His own eyes-- they're black, aren't they? Brother's eyes weren't black. They were red, red and unforgiving and cursing and -- -- _don't look into the eyes directly he'll do it again! _And suddenly his face is moving without his will and it's thrown back and it _stings_ and.

He just punched him. Why? He had just been... thinking. And looking at his lips and not answering and not listening and he lifts his eyes up to his face and.

Naruto's eyes are _blue_, not black not red but _blue_, and that's fine. That's normal, that's Naruto, and Sakura's are green aren't they and Kakashi has a red one too but not like Itachi's, borrowed, and his own are not like Itachi's. They're _not_.

"Look at me you --"

Naruto is still talking, and Sasuke almost smirk, fleeting resemblance to a twelve year old arrogant child, amusing himself with his could-be rival.

"Who would want to look at you, moron?"

Life goes on and everything will be _fine_, because if it's not, then he's let Itachi won.

Itachi won too many times already.


End file.
